Cooking for one (Mark Three)

Wednesday2000

I had toast and Flora for brekkie. I just sat out in the garden to play fetch with my dog and to read for a while but it is getting hot already so I came back in.

I made a green smoothie that is keeping cool in the fridge and I cooked some Quorn crispy nuggets. I will have them cold with a big salad for lunch.

Brambling

Lovely tomatoes Farway, I picked and ate the first baby plum tonight whilst watering there are several others which should be red tomorrow night if we get the forecasted heat.  I once planted mixed colour courgette seeds, yellow, pale green and dark green I gave my sister three plants and told her I had no idea which they were.  Fast forward a few weeks and I wandered into her garden and asked why she was letting them grow into marrows, it seems she was waiting for them to ripen as they were yellow and pale green 🙄 she had grown them before so should have known they didn't work that way 🙄 

my courgettes are still taking over the garden and the fridge 😁. Lunch was easy the last of the pineapple and melon as it was hot and I had pottered in the garden lunchtime.  Dinner was a large courgette stuffed with mince, vegetables and couscous sprinkled with blue cheese and baked.  Unfortunately I have another portion left to add to the two generous portions of last night's ratatouille currently in the fridge I don't think I can squeeze any more courgette based dishes into the freezer roll on new freezer on Wednesday just in time for the courgettes to finish 😁 so tomorrow will be courgette and more courgette and I have four more in the fridge, next door will be offered the two ready to pick tomorrow, they are going to start avoiding me

Farway

'Morning, I could "smell" the heat outside already as I watered the pots earlier, today is going to be a scorcher here, windows are wide open already

Early postie, fresh loose tea has arrived, and my neighbour bought some milk for me last night [she was out anyway].

I'm all set up now and won't need to do any shopping on line for this week

A topical tip, when clearing pea vines do not put ripe pea pods for 2021 seeds in your back pocket

I did and forgot about them, hence getting up for loo last night I was hot footing it across a floordrobe of hard dried peas 

Brambling, a freezer just in time. I don't grow courgettes because of the glut problems and I'm not that keen on them to warrant the space equired

I know just what you mean about "different" coloured veg, in the days of courgette growing I always grew the yellow ones.

My climbing French beans are of course purple but cook into green

Lunch, maybe a sausage sarnie.

I opened the 12 pack of W8rose bangers last night when I had a banger sarnie for dinner & froze all but two of the remainder

Those two are use by today so it's eat or freeze, they are nice non gristle ones even though in the "Essential" range.

Dinner, just has to be salad

I've some good sized bakers from my last @sda C& C, so one of those with I think LO beans filling and grated cheese topping

Should I get peckish there are LO stewed blackberries

caronc

Good afternoon everyone, 
I was awol yesterday as I had my first 'proper' venture out. Five of us headed for lunch at our favourite local hotel to celebrate my friend's 60th birthday and retirement. The weather was pants but we didn't care but thankfully it's picked up today, warm and dry but certainly not scorching. After lunch we sat and mattered for a couple of hours over tea/coffee and it was well after 4pm when we left by which time I was shattered and fit only to lounge on the vouch and have an early night. I had pork schnitzel with bacon, caramelised pineapple and maderia wine gravy for my main followed by a far too large 'crunchie' sundae which I couldn't finish. I enjoyed every mouthful of it all. I was still stuffed in the evening do didn't have anything else to eat.
Tesco has been this morning so that's us stocked back up on fresh stuff and essentials. 
I need to give my courgettes some tlc they are setting very well and with all the wet weather have been hit with mildew. I have standard, round and yellow ones but only had few standard and round ones so far. Hopefully we'll get a bit less rain over coming weeks and they'll come on a bit but I'm not anticipating a glut. My beans have been really slow as well but are flowering now so fingers crossed. 
I'm CFO for the next couple of nights as my son is having his usual Friday chippy tonight and is off out tomorrow evening. Tonight I'm having LO tandoori chicken and roast veg with either pitta or a baked spud. Lunch was a ham and cheese bagel with baby plum toms, fresh peas and the last of a punnet of local strawberries. 

Brambling

Glad you had a good lunch and catch up Caronc   

Farway my french beans were a heritage yellow variety and they stay that way one cook which also confused my sister as I grew on some plants for her. I'm thinking of going back to the purple climbers if I can find them as I have had good crops from them and they can share the wigwams with my runners.   I need to rethink my garden for next year as I have gotten better results for some things than others so I'm going to see what I can do about freeing up more space, the back garden is only about 40 foot long and as wide as the house, that includes the patio so not a lot of room to play with I always think that the 30ft front garden is a waste of space, they should have moved the house forward and given us bigger back gardens.  Less courgettes I think and other than tomatoes I may give up on the pots, maybe look at raised beds

My new dishwasher was delivered this morning, the kitchen floor was given a wash due to the 'strange' way the kitchen fitters had connect the DW and WM together!! they were big guys and it gets hot in my kitchen first thing so i was a bit  as they were quite sweaty by the time they finished so a wipe down was needed just for my peace of mind.  I ran it through empty and it is definitely quieter than the other one and no strange humming and whining. I was a little annoyed at the hard sale for an extended guarantee 'just £3 a month!' when I registered if for it's year guarantee 

Inspite of the heat i decided it would be a good idea to make a cake lunchtime  I used my nephew's courgette, carrot and orange cake recipe but made it into a loaf cake as I'm assuming it will be easier to freeze slices I guestimated the cooking time as  the original recipe was for two sandwich tins so it may end up in the freezer or the bin when I slice it later.  After some freezer fun I also managed to freeze the LO portion of stuffed courgette so hopefully there will be room for the cake or I'll have to eat it all myself over the weekend   

I wasn't hungry lunchtime once I had made the cake so other than FF greek yoghurt and berries 9am I haven't eaten.  Dinner will be LO ratatouille, white fish Kiev (air fried) and LO runner beans so nice and easy and not too much time cooking anything

I'm not working next week, my sister and I were planning to go away like we did last year but we have decided against a stayation I'm glad as the usual places in Devon, Cornwall and Dorset are looking really busy so I've planned a nice relaxing week with hopefully some time in the borrow beach hut and some tidying at home.  The contents of a kitchen cupboard are still spead out in the dining room, the dishwasher is plugged in at the back of it (it's a cupboard which goes back along way) so I plan to pull the rest out and sort to see what i still need, if it is pushed to the back of the cupboard do I still need it?

Baileys_Babe

Please @Brambling would you share the courgette,  carrot and orange cake recipe? it sounds delicious.

Brambling

Baileys_Babe said:

Please @Brambling would you share the courgette,  carrot and orange cake recipe? it sounds delicious.

I made mine in a loaf tin rather than two sandwich tins so cooked it between 55 - 60 mins and had to cover it with parchment paper after 45 mins.  I haven't iced it as i intend to freeze it but did sample it with a cuppa and it was as good as my nephew makes (if i may be immodest     Idea to get kids to eat their veg 

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/carrot-courgette-orange-cakes

Baileys_Babe

Brambling said:

Baileys_Babe said:

Please @Brambling would you share the courgette,  carrot and orange cake recipe? it sounds delicious.

I made mine in a loaf tin rather than two sandwich tins so cooked it between 55 - 60 mins and had to cover it with parchment paper after 45 mins.  I haven't iced it as i intend to freeze it but did sample it with a cuppa and it was as good as my nephew makes (if i may be immodest     Idea to get kids to eat their veg 

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/carrot-courgette-orange-cakes

It looks like an easy recipe, I'll get the children to make the cake

greenbee

My courgettes need a haircut, as it's difficult to spot the courgettes (yellow, and so far staying quite small) and the tomatoes and beans that are outside have been blown about so need propping up and tidying. I'm betting everything decides to be ready while I'm away...

@Brambling - have you thought about turning some of. your front garden into a fruit/veg patch? Someone up the road here has done it and it looks lovely - a proper cottage garden with no lawn, just rows of veg and flowers mixed together - sweet pea wigwams next to bean wigwams etc. The hedge means it's not all visible, and it's overlooked by the house (and there's a gate) so there doesn't seem to be a problem with people stealing stuff. And it means no mowing

Not sure what I'm going to eat tonight. Wine maybe?

Farway

'morning, thankfully much cooler today, bit dull & overcast at the moment.

May be too cloudy to spot the Spitfire later this afternoon, NHS hospitals flyover

Brambling, I had a rethink on my growing last year, hence more rhubarb with fewer currants & runner beans.

I think you could "get way with" growing purple climbing beans in the front, nice purple flowers as well.

I'm biased because I've got some of them twining round handrail & climbing up buddlia at the front, a late sowing so beans are just setting now

Have you been to West Dean Gardens? I

saw they had Spanish Flag vines intertwined with runners, not done it myself but that would look good, and good for pollination as well they say

Now I'm pondering raised beds but not sure I CBA at this stage.

I went to large pots because of bendy problems so any raised beds would need to be at last waist high!!

Lunch, a sarnie, probably BLT using the last of the streaky

Dinner, posh free range etc top side steak out & defrosted.

I'm not going to marinade this one, see how it goes with "better" steaks, the L's one benefited but higher quality meat??

I'll have it with salad & HM AF chips, may sample some of my yellow cherry toms now they are colouring up nicely

Trying to think ahead for tomorrow now, do I need to defrost summat? PIA thinking about it